"You send us Jews from Odessa, and we send you Jews from Odessa."
Posted on 11/23/2008 7:49:08 AM PST by Borges
What would happen if a leading British-based music magazine ranked the world's leading orchestras and the "winning" U.S. ensemble didn't care?
That's basically what's happened when leaders of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra shrugged their collective shoulders over the London monthly the Gramophone saying that it's the top classical outfit in the United States.
"I think it is safe to say that we are not advocates or necessarily firm believers in lists of this sort, given the subjective nature of these types of rankings," said CSO President Deborah Rutter, using the sort of language that one usually hears from someone who's just been voted off the island, not named king of the hill.
Although such surveys are basically not much more than publicity gimmicks for the outlet conducting and trumpeting them, the Gramophone's December cover story list is a cut above many similar lists. (I've heard all 20 international orchestras on the list perform live, as well as two other excellent and historic U.S. orchestras that are odd omissions from the list, the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Pittsburgh Symphony.)
Coming out on top is Amsterdam's universally revered Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, a superb orchestra that was led for decades by the CSO's current principal conductor, Bernard Haitink. Not surprisingly, the top ensembles of Berlin, Vienna and London follow and Chicago pops up at No. 5 on the overall chart.
Perhaps the biggest winner in the pack, though, is the Concertgebouw's music director Mariss Jansons. The Latvian-Jewish conductor has two ensembles in the Gramophone's "Top 10" -- Munich's Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra was rated No. 6 overall, just behind the CSO and just before the exceptional Cleveland Orchestra.
The high ranking for the Dresden Staatskapelle (No. 10) seems reasonable after their outstanding showing at Orchestra Hall on Sunday. The Los Angeles Philharmonic at No. 8, three places above the far superior Boston Symphony Orchestra, seems a stretch, although well-traveled Los Angeles Times critic Mark Swed was on the Gramophone jury. A top 10 spot for the spunky Budapest Festival Orchestra is another oddity. Former CSO music director Daniel Barenboim's Berlin Staatskapelle is nowhere to be seen.
"As everyone should know," Rutter continued in an e-mail, "on any given evening anywhere and everywhere in the world there are 'best concerts' taking place by many great orchestras. Music is always a subjective experience, and that's why there isn't and can't be a World Series in our world to firmly, regularly rank orchestras.
"All that said, in any case, it is wonderful to have international recognition of our truly superb and peerless orchestra."
Here are the Top 20...
1) Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Amsterdam
2) Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
3) Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra
4) London Symphony Orchestra
5) Chicago Symphony Orchestra
6) Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra
7) Cleveland Orchestra
8) Los Angeles Philharmonic
9) Budapest Festival Orchestra
10) Dresden Staatskapelle
11) Boston Symphony Orchestra
12) New York Philharmonic
13) San Francisco Symphony
14) Mariinsky Theater Orchestra (tours the West as the Kirov Orchestra)
15) Russian National Orchestra
16) Leningrad Philharmonic
17) Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra
18) Metropolitan Opera Orchestra
19) Saito Kinen Orchestra (Japan)
20) Czech Philharmonic
Classical Music Ping
thank you.
No Academy of St. Martin In-The-Fields? No LA Symphony?
Weird list.
That struck me as weird. Were all the Catholics, Lutherans and Seventh Day Adventists in the article also identified as such?
As they say in Brooklyn: "What's up wit' dat?"
Trying to win more action in the Windy City now that Obama has won?
Georg Solti was the Vince Lombardi of the CSO.
What you really need is a great conductor, the orchestra only has to be reasonably good.
But the great ones have all passed on.
I’ve always thought Neville Marriner was sort of a hack.
It is a crime that the NY Philharmonic is now only the 5th best in the US.
The LA Philharmonic is on the list.
They’ve been under less than inspiring leadership over the last 20 years or so. It will be interesting to see what Alan Gilbert does there.
There was a fine article in the New Yorker last year, where they compared the stick technique of Furtwangler and Mengelberg with the way today’s jet-set conductor leads an orchestra. The modern style is rather homogenized compared to the old days.
Last time I went to the NY Philharmonic, Bernstein was conducting.
I disagree with putting the Met Orchestra so low.
What they’ve become under Levine, (especially in the Wagnerian reperatoire), is arguably in the top five. Certainly better than the Kirov under Georgiev, who with the ham-handed Bang-Bang...er Lang-Lang just murdered the Rachmaninoff Second Concerto in a recent DG recording.
The CSO was number 1 under Sir Georg. But they were also peerless when Giulini conducted.
Philly has fallen that far, huh?
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